An Account of the Abipones, an Equestrian People of Paraguay, (2 of 3)

Amongst the Payaguas there exists a law that if any of them dies of a disease, the physician who undertook his cure shall be put to death by the arrows of the assembled people; and being desperately addicted to revenge, they are steadfast in the execution of this cruel law. During my residence in the city of Asumpcion, an unhappy physician atoned for the death of his patient by his own. Were this law in force amongst the Abipones, fewer of them would profess themselves followers of Galen; they would shun the dangerous profession of medicine, and physicians would cease to grow like funguses in a night. Of this I am quite sure, that in every Abiponian horde there are more physicians than sick persons: deterred by no danger of loss of fame or life, and certain of reward, they besiege the beds of the sick, and suck away their strength in every disease. When questioned on the patient's danger, they make the happiest forebodings. If the event turn out contrary to their prognostics, they have always a ready excuse: the disease was a fatal one, or their skill was baffled by the magical arts of some other juggler; the matter rests here, for it would be a crime to doubt the excuse of a juggler.

Though sucking is the chief and almost only cure in use amongst the Abipones, yet they have some dream-like ideas of our remedies. At times, when oppressed by the heat of the sun, or inflamed with a feverish burning, they will draw blood by piercing their arm or leg with a knife. Medicinal herbs, of which their country produces so great a variety, they scarce know by name, yet are desirous of being thought well skilled in the mysteries of nature. Hence, not so much in the desire of restoring the sick person, as of increasing their own reputation, they would sometimes prescribe the leaves of a tree, or the roots of some little known plant, on which the druggist might safely write quid pro quo, these remedies being generally of such a nature, that they are more likely to miss than be of any service. At the end of a fatiguing journey, I fell ill in the town of Concepcion. A woman, of high repute for skill in the healing art, comes and gives me a large dark root, promising me the complete restoration of my health, if I would drink it well boiled in water. I shuddered at the medicine, but still more at the old hag that prescribed it.

The Guarany tongue is as rich as the Abiponian is poor in the names of wholesome plants, and not a few of the Guaranies are well acquainted with the use of them. In the town of St. Joachim I knew an Indian named Ignacio Yaricà, eight years an attendant upon the sick, whose dexterity and success I could not but admire. He would set a broken limb, and entirely heal it in a very short time by means of swathes of reeds and four little herbs. The woods of America also produce a kind of dark green ivy, which twines itself round the branches of trees, and is called by the Spaniards suelda con suelda. This plant cut small, boiled in water, and bound with linen on to the limb, soon and happily consolidates it. In the city of Corrientes, a Spanish matron was cured of a sprained foot, by merely wrapping it in the fresh skin of a puppy. The Abipones are totally ignorant of medicines for purging the bowels, causing perspiration, removing bile, and dispelling noxious humours. They will not even bear the mention of an enema. In the town of St. Jeronymo, a Spanish soldier who professed the art of medicine, being requested by Father Brigniel to attend upon a sick Abipon, declared the necessity of an injection. No sooner did the sick man feel the syringe applied to him, than he started furiously out of bed, snatched up a lance, and would have slain the soldier physician, had he not saved himself by hasty flight. Sudden terror giving way to rage, the old Spaniard, whilst we were laughing, poured forth a volley of curses on his ungrateful patient. "You had better call up a devil from hell, Fathers," said he, "to cure this beast. When I offered him medicine, the savage tried to kill me: he opposes a lance to a syringe. Who could contend with such unequal arms?" The Guaranies have the same repugnance to the use of the syringe. The Indians use snuff as a medicine, stuffing it into their ears, when they find them badly affected by the rain or wind. The jugglers vauntingly affirm, that they have it in their power to perform cures by words alone. Sitting on the sick man's bed they sing extemporary verses, as magical charms, either to reconcile the evil spirit, or to call up the shades of the dead by whose assistance they hope to remove all diseases. But away with this superstitious nonsense. The Abiponian physicians show how little they confide in their own arts, when, on being seized with a disorder, they neglect to consult their colleagues, and prefer the aid of any European who will prescribe for them. At the time that I dwelt amongst the Abipones, the most famous in the art of medicine was Pariekaikin, the chief of the jugglers, who, on being seized with pleurisy, called on me to heal him in preference to any of his colleagues. Calcined hartshorn, boiled in barley-water, restored him to health, and gained me the reputation of a physician amongst the Abipones. Nothing will procure you the good-will of the savages so soon as skill in the healing art. They think that he who understands the natures and remedies of diseases can be ignorant of nothing. They will believe him in matters of religion, and be tractable and obedient to him. Our Saviour himself inspired mortals with wonder, by healing bodies as well as souls. In imitation of him, when we were employed in the instruction of the savages, we endeavoured to supply the want of physicians, surgeons, and druggists, by easily obtained remedies, by reading medical books, and by other means, in order to wean that miserable people from their jugglers, whom we accounted the chief obstacles to the propagation of the holy religion.

It is incredible how well the sick are taken care of in the Guarany towns. Indians are appointed to attend upon them, more or fewer, according to the number of inhabitants. These men have some knowledge of herbs and common remedies, though they are not allowed to use any medicine without consulting the missionary. They carry in their hands a staff marked with a cross, and are hence called crossbearers. It is their business to go about dawn to visit the sick in the district appointed to each, and to enquire whether any one has fallen ill lately. In the evening they make their report to the missionary in the presence of all, before he performs divine service, and are informed by him what remedies are to be used and what sacraments administered to each. At mid-day boiled meat with the best wheat bread is sent from his kitchen to the houses of all the sick, which are sometimes thirty, more or less, in number. All the sick are visited once every day, and sometimes oftener, by the missionary, accompanied by two boys. In short we never suffered any thing of use to the minds or bodies of the sick to be wanting. Moreover there resided amongst the Guaranies two or three lay-brothers of our order, European surgeons, tolerably skilled in the art of medicine; but on account of the great distance of the towns from one another, they were not always at hand to offer their assistance when it was needed.

Upon us, therefore, whose proper business it was to attend upon the minds of the sick, devolved the care of healing their bodies. We always ascribed it to the mercy of God when trifling remedies banished great diseases, for we had but a very scanty store of drugs. How useful to the sick in various ways were sulphur, alum, salt, tobacco, sugar, pepper, the fat of hens, tigers, oxen, sheep, &c. and gun-powder! scarce a day passed that the sick did not ask for one of these things. Three gourds were always in readiness filled with as many ointments: one green, made of suet, and thirty different herbs; the second black; the third yellow. Each of these was destined to a separate purpose. We also had at hand plenty of sanative herbs, and the barks of trees famed for medicinal virtues. Numerous animals, moreover, supply the Americans with medicine. I will mention a few. A cataplasm of crocodiles' fat heals bruises. The stomach of the same when dried, ground to powder, and drank with water, is said to relieve the pain of the stone. The Spaniards and Indians wear a crocodile's tooth suspended from their neck or arm, and believe that it will defend them from the bites of serpents. Persons bitten by serpents scrape some dust from a crocodile's tooth, and drink it mixed with water. The little stones found in the stomach of the crocodile when ground to powder, and drank, alleviate the pains of stone in the kidneys. Calcined tigers' claws, mixed with alum calcined also and reduced to powder, are a potent remedy for the tooth-ache. Tiger's fat instantly expels worms from the head or any other part of the body, if laid on the place where they attempt egress. Common house-flies often creep through the mouth or nose into the heads of sleeping persons, and there breed worms thick in the middle, terminating in a red point at each end, but white every where else, about as long as the nail of the little finger, and surrounded with circles like rings. Within a few hours they multiply to an incredible degree, and gnaw that part of the head where they lie. The inconvenience occasioned by their numbers, or want of food, obliges them to attempt an exit wherever it can be effected. A reddish spot on the surface of the skin is a mark of the intended eruption. The circumference of this spot must be anointed with tiger's fat, the detestable stench of which induces the worms to redouble their efforts, pierce through the bones and flesh, and break entirely out. I was astonished to see more worms than could be contained in my cap, proceed from the head of an Indian in the town of St. Joachim. Nor can I understand how one man's head is capable of receiving or supporting such a number of maggots. But from this we may conclude the incredible compression of the worms in so small a space. They make a passage between the eyebrows, but so narrow, that only one at a time can go out, and they succeed one another without interruption; the slender wound soon heals, a little gap in the flesh remaining like a scar. The Indian doubted not to attribute his recovery to tiger's fat, which I prescribed for other persons with equal success. You shall now hear a still more singular fact. That rattle which a certain poisonous serpent has annexed to its tail, is a noble medicine: for when reduced to powder, and placed on hollow teeth, it softens them so that they fall out of themselves without any sense of pain. It is also useful in other complaints.

In order to obtain a knowledge of the nature of diseases, and of medicinal herbs, we diligently studied the books of physicians and herbalists; by which means, as we often were of service to the sick, we wrought so far with the Abipones, that whenever they were seized with any disorder they placed all their hopes on our assistance, to the neglect of their jugglers. When I distrusted myself and felt anxious for the life of my patient, I never rashly prescribed any medicine. To defend him from the injuries of the air, and to prevent him from eating or drinking any thing improper in his situation, was my chief care. I afforded him as much wholesome food as I could, from my own provisions. If these regulations were of no avail, I gave him a medicine that had been tried by long use, and which, if it did no good, could at any rate do no harm. The savages, won by our courtesy and kindness, suffered themselves to be baptized; for at first, whenever they fell sick, the dread of baptism induced them to fly to the lurking-holes of the woods, or cause others to carry them there. During the latter years, almost all of them reposed the greatest confidence in us, and entertained the utmost good-will towards us, and if they remembered our having ever cured them with any medicine, desired to have it given to their hordesmen when they fell ill. From one instance you may judge of others. In the northern parts of Paraguay there grows a nut, called Piñon del Paraguay by the Spaniards, and by physicians nux cathartica, because it causes both vomiting and purging. It ridiculously deceived the first Spaniards who visited Paraguay. Delighted with its sweetness they eagerly ate this fruit, and to the great amusement of all, found what they had taken for food to be a medicine, which attacks the human body with double arms, and expels noxious or superfluous humours by two ways. We gave three or four of these nuts to the Abipones, for whom we thought purging necessary, and they all received great benefit from the use of them. Hence, whenever they felt any weight on their stomachs, they asked us for this medicine of their own accord. The same was the case with regard to other remedies. The old women, who obstinately adhered to former customs, raved when they found their medicines laughed at, and the fountain of their gains dried up. The jugglers, who had sucked the bodies, and drained the property of the sick, were despised by their countrymen as a set of worthless drones.

The Patagonians, and other southern savages, think the body of a sick person to be possessed of an evil demon. Their physicians carry about drums, with horrible forms depicted on them, which they strike by the sick man's bed, either to consult the demon concerning the nature of the disease, or to drive it from the body of their patient. If any one dies of a disease, the relations persecute the physician most terribly, as the author of his death. If a Cacique dies, they put all the physicians to death, that they may not fly elsewhere. Actuated by an irrational kind of pity, they bury the dying before they expire. Father Strobl pulled one man alive from the grave. The Guaycurùs call their physicians Nigienigis. A gourd filled with hard seeds, and a fan of dusky emu feathers are their chief insignia, and medical instruments, which they always carry in their hands that they may be known. I must not omit to speak of the physicians of the Chiquitos. A juggler physician, when he goes to visit the sick, fills his belly with the most exquisite dainties, chickens, hens, and partridges, that he may render his breath wholesomer and stronger to suck and blow the body of his patient. Whilst the physician feasts sumptuously, the sick man has insipid half-boiled maize given him to eat. If he dislikes this, no one will exhort the poor wretch to take food, so that more persons die of hunger than of the disease. At his first coming, the physician overwhelms the sick man with an hundred questions: "Where were you yesterday?" says he. "What roads did you tread? Did you overturn the jug, and spill the drink prepared from maize? What? Have you imprudently given the flesh of a tortoise, stag, or boar, to be devoured by dogs?" Should the sick man confess to having done any of these things, "It is well," replies the physician, "we have discovered the cause of your disorder. The soul of that beast having entered your body torments you even now, and is, alas! the origin of the pains you feel." The savage takes this for an oracle. The cure is immediately set about. The juggler sucks the afflicted part once, twice, and three times. Then muttering a doleful charm, he knocks the floor on which the sick man is lying, with a club, to frighten away the soul of that animal from his patient's body. A crueller method of curing was once customary amongst the Chiquitos.

When a husband fell ill, they used to kill the wife, thinking her the cause of his sickness, and foolishly imagining that, when she was removed, he would be sure to recover. At other times they consulted their physicians, which of the female jugglers occasioned the disease. These men, actuated either by desire of vengeance or interested motives, named whomsoever they chose, and were not required to bring any proofs of the guilt of the accused. The sentence of a juggler was an oracle, and people assembled from all parts to put it in execution. Such were the Chiquitos before they were civilized by the Jesuits.